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This week has been all about slopes and snow! We kicked off the winter ski season last week with Randolph's very first "Slope Day" on Friday and continued it this week with Slope Day, Part 2 - read more here! After sparking the children's interest, we provided slope-related materials in our own classroom for exploration. As we have been missing the winter weather, we are creating own own, making snow dough out of cornstarch and hair conditioner and exploring ice in different way. We have also been reading "snowy" books including The Mitten (Brett), The Hat (Brett), and The Snowy Day (Keats). We have our fingers crossed for some snow for sledding, snowballs, and snowmen soon!
We were lucky enough to be the first to "adopt" the slope wall on the bulletin board, designed and created through a whole-school collaboration on Friday. The children were excited to test out the existing marble runs and build their own. We also had some problem-solving to do, as a few of the marble runs had moved in transit and needed to be fixed. Another important job was to create "marble catchers" so we didn't have loose marbles rolling all over our floors! Overall, we are learning to move carefully and deliberately as we share space with each other and this relatively fragile creation.
We also highlighted the different sorts of tunnels and ramps that we have in our own block area, finding new ways to use familiar materials such as cars and rings. We have been using scientific terms like balance, steep, gentle or gradual, and angle to describe our structures as we work.
Snow Dough!
Day 1: We mixed cornstarch and hair conditioner to find the right ratio. We were in search of a specific texture and "holdability" so we kept testing and tweaking until we had it right.
Day 2: The snow dough spent the previous night in the refrigerator and we explored to see if it felt and/or acted differently.
Day 3: The snow dough spent the previous night in the freezer and we explored it to notice any differences.
It has been quite the experience to feel the snow and see how it changes over time. We also found that a big part of playing with snow dough is cleaning up when we are finished. We had just the right size brooms and dust pans to pick up the slippery dough from the floor!
Other ways we have been exploring winter, weather, and animals:
- painting with ice using watercolors
- building home for arctic animals with magna-tiles
- exploring loose ice cubes with different tools
- using white paint and black paper alongside inspirational artists with Nina's guidance
We have also welcomed a new student, Naomi, to the Fungi Friends! She is pictured in the below left photo, second from the left. Growing our class has provided the perfect opportunity to reestablish community norms and boundaries and revisit all our most beloved songs and stories. We, of course, couldn't miss the opportunity to learn a new song about balance :) to the tune of one of our favorites, The Dinosaur Song. Here are the updated lyrics and actions:
Form a circle. Invite one friend to stand on a string in the middle.
Sing:
One elephant went balancing
Step by step on a piece of string
They had such enormous fun
That they called for another elephant to come!
(*elephant noise*)
The first elephant invites a second elephant to stand behind them on the string, with the second elephant's hands on the first's shoulders. Then, sing "two elephants went balancing..." The second elephant invites a third elephant onto the string, and so on. See us balancing in the photo below!
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